AGRA: What could possibly be a case of honour killing of a couple, a 17-year-old student of Jawahar Lal Inter College, Aligarh, was allegedly beaten to death by the
family members of the Pradhan of Village Jatpura after he was caught with the latter’s granddaughter early on Thursday morning. Barely 12 hours after his death, the girl, Kumari Soni, also died under mysterious circumstances, leading to suspicion of honour killings of the couple.
While the girl’s family claimed that Soni had committed suicide by hanging herself at 5pm, cops aren’t buying their story and suspect that she too could have been murdered just like her boyfriend, Mridul Kumar.
According to police officials, a murder case was registered earlier during the day against the village Pradhan, Kashmiri Devi’s four sons, Raju (42), Mukesh (44), Dinesh (32) and Brijesh (30) on the basis of a complaint filed by Mridul’s father, Janki Prasad. However, only Dinesh had been arrested, as the others had absconded. Police have also detained some other relatives of the Pradhan for questioning.
"A student of class XI, Mridul, had allegedly gone to meet Soni late last at her house and was caught with her by her family members early in the morning. Soni was reportedly one-year senior to him and both belong to the same community," police said.
Talking to TOI, Mridul’s father Janki Prasad, who is a primary school teacher, said that he received a call from Pradhan’s son, Brijesh, around 5am informing that his son was at his house. Brijesh asked the boy’s father to come and take him away from there.
Prasad told TOI that when he reached Pradhan’s house, which is around 100 meters away from his house, he found Mridul in a bad shape. “My son was unconscious, and was bleeding badly from his nose”, said Prasad, adding that he immediately picked him up and rushed him to the hospital.
Doctors at a private hospital in Chhara declared him brought dead, said Prasad. He added that he took his son’s body back to Pradhan’s house and demanded why they had killed him.
Prasad alleged that his son, who was sleeping with his six siblings including five sisters in their other house was called by Pradhan’s family members and then beaten with sticks to death. He denied that he had gone there to meet the girl.
While the police were still present at the Pradhan’s house, they were informed at about 5 Pm that Soni had committed suicide by hanging herself. Senior police officials at the spot suspect that the family could be lying, as it was not possible for the girl to hang herself with some many people present in the house.
Aligarh SSP Ajay Kumar Sahini said that bodies of both Mridul and Soni have been sent for postmortem and further action will be taken after receipt of the report.
Mridul Kumar and Kumari Soni. 
